It’s not just about the best draft pick or the final score of the Super Bowl game. Sports reporting and social media should stand behind the journalism core: accuracy.
“Accuracy is the key thing but now people are worried about ‘I got to tweet this now,’” Angela Sun, Yahoo! Sports Minute host, said.
“Taking action: Covering sports in social media” panelists all agreed although social media have transformed the dissemination of information, including sports, journalism principles should be held accountable.
“Still there’s mistakes because there’s always that pressure to turn out blog posts,” Ren Hsieh, sports blogger and executive director of The Dynasty Project, said.
One of the issues brought up during the discussion was the Jeremy Lin incident, which sent waves of reactions throughout the Asian-American community and the media.
Don Yee, Yee & Dubin sports management firm owner and lawyer, said if you feel something is wrong, “go ahead and call it.”
“I’m willing to bet that some people do not know any better,” Jenn de la Fuente, a former sports journalist, said. “We’ve just got to educate them.”
So how does social media comes into play?
Hsieh said blogs with different perspectives are great reads for reactions of a draft pick or a team win, yet major media outlets are still the trusted source for straight facts and accurate reporting. The level of sophistication in reporting will determine if the reader trusts the writer’s words or not, he added.
De la Fuente put it quite simply, “You don’t believe on Twitter until the AP confirms it.”
-Brian De Los Santos, V3con blogger
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